Ferrari hint at Austrian GP upgrade - but already talk down its impact

Ferrari have hinted they will bring an upgrade at the F1 Austrian Grand Prix, but it is not expected to transform their competitive fortunes. 

A revamped rear suspension could be introduced as soon as the next race at the Red Bull Ring. It is hoped the new design will help the SF-25 cope with extra loads through high-speed corners and enable it to run in a more optimum ride-height window.

Ferrari team principal Fred Vasseur confirmed a new upgrade is coming ahead of the British Grand Prix, though he downplayed the impact it is set to have.

“We will have an upgrade soon, before the UK. And perhaps another one a bit later,” Vasseur said following the Canadian Grand Prix.

“But honestly today, I think there is much more into the execution and what you are getting from the car than into the potential of the car itself.

“Now we are at the end of the life of these regulations, and we all know that when we are bringing something on track we are more speaking about hundredths than tenths. And if you don't do a good usage of the car, because the set-up is a bit different, you can lose tenths.

“A couple of times, on our side at least, and we are not the only one, when we brought upgrades in the past, we needed also one or two races to adapt the car, the set-up to the new version.

“Honestly I think that, and I want to put the focus on the team, there is much more [to come from] the execution than the pure potential of the car. But we will bring something.”

Vasseur admitted Ferrari “failed massively” to exploit the full potential of their 2025 F1 car in Montreal as Charles Leclerc and Lewis Hamilton could only finish in fifth and sixth place.

Hamilton and Leclerc’s upgrade push

Both Leclerc and seven-time world champion Hamilton have insisted Ferrari are in need of upgrades to have any chance of contending for victories.

Speaking after equaling his season-best qualifying in Canada with P5, Hamilton said: “More often than not we go through FP1 and then at previous races FP2s have not been so great, because there's been something wrong with the car - like the floor's not working or the rear wing's stopped working/

"There's always been something that meant we were down on downforce or something. So then you have a bad FP2 and you're kind of recovering in FP3

"But we had a good solid day yesterday and then today we made progress. We didn't change a huge amount, and the car felt solid. We moved forwards - which I think is a first for this season. So I'm grateful to get through to Q3.”

Hamilton said changes to his driving style had the biggest influence on his improved qualifying result, something Leclerc has also alluded to at times this season.

"Probably today most progress came from my driving, changing and adapting my driving style," Hamilton said.

"I just made a few changes in how I was driving the car. This car drives so differently to what I had before. You go into low-speed corners and you're waiting and waiting - it doesn't want to turn. It's definitely not suited for this circuit.

“So it's just incremental steps. We've not had any upgrades or anything like that, it's been the same car for quite some time now. And with the same package each weekend, I'm just challenging the guys.

"I'm constantly battling the engineers, asking them questions. Because they set things up and are like 'this is how we always do it' and I'm like 'what about this?’.

“So we work on trying things and bit by bit, we are making progress. We're improving our qualifying from Monaco onwards, which is positive. Ultimately we need upgrades. We need an upgrade to be able to fight the guys up front."